Karl Ehrhardt

Karl Ehrhardt (November 26, 1924 – February 5, 2008) was one of the New York Mets' most visible fans and an icon at Shea Stadium from its opening in 1964 through 1981. Known as the "Sign Man," Ehrhardt held up 20-by-26-inch blackcardboard signs with sayings in big white (sometimes orange) upper-cased paper characters that reflected the Mets' performance on the field, and echoed the fans' sentiments off of it. He usually brought a portfolio holding about sixty of his 1,200 signs to the stadium, each of them with color-coded file tabs for different situations. He was always positioned in the field-level box seats on the third base side, wearing a black derby with a royal-blue-and-orange band around the bottom of the crown and the primary Mets logo on the front. Ehrhardt wasn't afraid to criticize the team's front office, once holding up a sign labelling Shea Stadium as "GRANT'S TOMB", referring to the team's miserable play and M. Donald Grant, the team's chairman of the board.

"A" and "G" - Which he held in each hand, raising and lowering each, to punctuate the crowd's chanting of center fielder Tommie Agee's name, after his second game-saving catch in Game 3 of the 1969 World Series.

"DO YOUR THING HEYWOOD" - Flashed at Heywood Hale Broun at the end of his 1969 feature about Ehrhardt on the CBS Evening News.

"BELIEVE IN MIRACLES?" - Flashed during the decisive Game 5 of the 1969 World Series.

"BYE, BYE, BIRDIES" - Flashed during the same game.

"THERE ARE NO WORDS" - The sign that Ehrhardt held up when the Mets' left fielderCleon Jones caught the final out to clinch the team's first World Series Championship. This was his most famous creation, seen in the Series highlight film.[5]

"THEY SAID IT COULDN'T BE DONE" - Held high from a convertible, as Ehrhardt rode with the Mets' victory parade in the Canyon of Heroes in lower Manhattan.

"NAILED BY THE (picture of a hammer)" - Held up after a home run was hit by slugging first baseman John Milner, whose nickname was "The Hammer".

"YOU'RE FIRED!" - Held up during Game Three of the 1973 World Series when the Oakland Athletics committed an error. The sign referred to A's owner Charlie Finley's attempt to have infielder Mike Andrews removed from the team after a pair of difficult Game Two errors in the twelfth inning helped the Mets win the game.

"KONG!" - For Dave Kingman's first regular season home run at home as a Met, helping to tag Kingman with the nickname King Kong.

"THE KING OF SWING" - Another tribute to Kingman, drawing on the nickname given jazz legend Benny Goodman.

"THE SIGNMAN LIVES!" - Used on his return to Shea Stadium at a game against the Los Angeles Dodgers in August, 2002 to help celebrate the Mets' 40th anniversary.